RELATED LINKS

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - Junior Abbey Friend scored five goals and
added an assist to lead the third-ranked North Carolina women's lacrosse team
to a 17-11 win over eighth-ranked Georgetown Saturday afternoon at Fetzer
Field. The Tar Heels improved to 7-1 on the season with the win, while the
Hoyas fell to 5-2.

"I was happy with our performance," said UNC coach Jenny
Levy. "This team is a work in progress and I believe that with each day and
each game we're going to continue to improve and we saw that today.

"I thought it was a total team effort - we played some good
defense, and I thought the draw control made a big difference for us today and
created a lot of offensive opportunities. I was really pleased - I challenged
my kids in a couple of different ways and in all of those areas they did a
great job."

After Georgetown's Meghan Farrell kicked off the scoring
with a goal in the third minute of play, the Tar Heels scored seven in a row and
led 7-1 with just over 12 minutes remaining in the first half. Senior Kara Cannizzaro
scored the first two and had three of the Tar Heels' first five, with the
others in that run coming from Friend (two) and freshmen Aly Messinger and
Sammy Jo Tracy.

The Hoyas stormed back, with three in a row to make the
score 7-4 before Friend ended the Tar Heel drought with an unassisted goal at
the 6:39 mark. After that, the teams traded goals leading into the break and
the Tar Heels were up 10-6 at halftime.

Carolina junior Taylor George opened the second half scoring
with a goal, assisted by Friend, just 21 seconds into the period. But
Georgetown then mounted its second run of the game, scoring the next four goals
to pull within one at 11-10 with 19 minutes to play. Farrell, who led the Hoyas
with four goals on the day, scored two in the run.

The Tar Heels held onto the lead and pulled away again,
scoring five goals in a row to regain a comfortable lead. Five different
players - Tracy, Friend, George, Messinger and Brittney Coppa - scored in the
span.

"When you play a good opponent, they're going to make a run,"
Levy said. "Georgetown is a really good team. Them making a run doesn't surprise
me at all. For us, we knew that was going to be in the cards at some point. How
do we respond? I thought we did a great job and showed a good amount of
toughness in being resilient and staying with the game plan and finally coming up
with some defensive stops to get some momentum offensively."

Senior Lauren Maksym played the first half in goal for UNC,
making five saves and allowing six goals. Freshman Megan Ward played the second
half, with five goals allowed and six saves.

Barb Black played all 60 minutes in goal for Georgetown,
making six saves.

Saturday's win came at the start of a three-game homestand
for the Tar Heels. They host Cornell on Wednesday and Boston College on
Saturday, with both starts set for 7 p.m.